Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment's San Fer­nan­do East par­ty groups have so far com­plet­ed in­ter­nal elec­tions for 11 of the 30 groups, with the re­main­ing 19 ex­pect­ed to com­plete the ex­er­cise by Sep­tem­ber 25.

PNM Elec­tions Of­fi­cer In­dar Paras­ram con­firmed this yes­ter­day, say­ing the elec­tions have been pro­ceed­ing smooth­ly.

"The San Fer­nan­do East elec­tions have been go­ing smooth­ly, and the var­i­ous par­ty groups are con­tin­u­ing their ex­er­cis­es un­til they fin­ish next week," he said.

The elec­tions be­gan last Sun­day and are be­ing held as the San Fer­nan­do East con­stituen­cy com­pletes its in­ter­nal arrange­ments ahead of the PNM's No­vem­ber con­ven­tion.

Once the group elec­tions are com­plet­ed, the San Fer­nan­do East Women's and Youth League units will hold their in­ter­nal elec­tions, fol­lowed by the elec­tion of a new con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive for the San Fer­nan­do East unit on Oc­to­ber 15.

Hazel Man­ning, wid­ow of long­stand­ing San Fer­nan­do East MP Patrick Man­ning, a for­mer prime min­is­ter, and moth­er of cur­rent MP Bri­an Man­ning, has of­fered to con­test the post of con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive chair­man.

The San Fer­nan­do East con­stituen­cy is the last to com­plete its in­ter­nal arrange­ments ahead of the con­ven­tion, fol­low­ing a pe­ri­od of pub­lic ten­sion be­tween Man­ning and for­mer ex­ec­u­tive chair­man Pa­tri­cia Alex­is.

The is­sues be­tween Man­ning and Alex­is, which erupt­ed in pub­lic clash­es, are now be­ing han­dled in­ter­nal­ly.

Alex­is and the ex­ec­u­tive she led re­signed af­ter the par­ty lead­er­ship met with the group, while Man­ning was al­so pub­licly rep­ri­mand­ed.

Man­ning was not im­me­di­ate­ly avail­able for com­ment on the on­go­ing par­ty group polls. How­ev­er, sources close to him said there had not been any ma­jor is­sues so far.

As the San Fer­nan­do East con­stituen­cy con­tin­ues its in­ter­nal elec­tions, the PNM will to­day al­so su­per­vise the elec­tion of a new con­stituen­cy ex­ec­u­tive for the Trinci­ty-Mal­oney unit.

That unit had al­so en­coun­tered is­sues in re­cent weeks fol­low­ing the can­cel­la­tion of a par­ty group elec­tion meet­ing. The can­cel­la­tion re­sult­ed in new mem­bers who had paid their mem­ber­ship dues de­mand­ing the re­turn of their fees, but of­fi­cials said the mat­ter was dealt with.